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By Rachael O'Connor
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Shocking research has warned that humans are driving extinctions at a scale not seen since the mass extinction of the dinosaurs some 66 million years ago.
The researchers from the University of York, in the United Kingdom, believe that if human-triggered extinction continue at current rates, such will reach the threshold of a mass extinction.
According to the Natural History Museum, a mass extinction is defined by passing the threshold loss of 75 percent of the world's species in less than 2.8 million years, a relatively short period of geological time.
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By reviewing decades of research on environmental change, along with discussions with palaeobiologists and ecologists, the new paper compared the loss of modern species with those preserved in fossil records.
Humans have had an impact on biodiversity as far back as 130,000 years ago, with the disappearance of mammoths and giant sloths—and extinction has continued in our wake as the human race spread across the globe.
In modern times, the Tasmanian tiger, the dodo, and the Steller's sea cow are but a few iconic examples of species lost as a result of human activity.
"The pace of change we’re seeing today is unlike anything we know of in the past 66 million years," said paper author and ecologist Jack Hatfield in a statement. Howevever, he also said that "crucially, it's not too late."
"It’s a complex, nuanced story, but the message is clear—our species has become a defining force in Earth’s history, and we still have the power to decide how that story ends.”
Speaking to Newsweek, Hatfield added: "We found that human caused extinctions are faster and greater in extent than anything else we know of since the extinction of the dinosaurs.
"Although the losses to date may not yet represent a sixth mass extinction, we are now the dominant force in shaping the future of life on our planet—what happens next is up to us."
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Earth has seen five major extinction events in its past. The worst occured some 252 million years ago at the end of the Permian period. Sometimes dubbed the "Great Dying," this event saw the demise of a staggering 81 percent of marine species and some 70 percent of their land-based counterparts. Geologists believe that the primary trigger was climatic and ocean changes related to large-scale volcanic eruptions in what is today Siberia, Russia.
Perhaps more famous is the dinosaur-killing Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) extinction event some 66 million years ago. Thought to have been caused by the impact of a massive asteroid into Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula, the K–Pg event wiped out around three-quarters of all species of plants and animals.
Hatfield and his colleagues believe that the current rate of extinction is more comparable to a more recent and smaller episode in the history of life known as the Eocene–Oligocene extinction event, which took place around 34 million years ago.
That extinction episode is thought to have been the result of global cooling and formation of ice sheets across the Antarctic. The difference is that the Eocene–Oligocene extinction occurred over the course of millions of years, rather than the comparatively slight 100,000 years of human impact.
Hatfield warned that the Eocene–Oligocene "shows us the power of major climatic changes to alter life on our planet."
He added: "Our review also highlights the difficulty of comparing the present and the past; there are gaps in the fossil record, unknown species, and extinctions that go unnoticed today, which all cloud the picture.
"But if we bring what we do know together, the evidence still points to a rapidly shifting world that has been driven almost entirely by human activity, and it's now in our hands to change this picture.”
Hatfield said that the team is now working to study in more detail how past extinction eventst reshaped life on Earth, to understand the potential long-term consequences of human-wrought change.
Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about ecology? Let us know via science@newsweek.com.
Update, 10/20/2025, 08:04 ET: This story has been updated with additional comments from Jack Hatfield.
Reference
Hatfield, J. H., Allen, B. J., Carroll, T., Dean, C. D., Deng, S., Gordon, J. D., Guillerme, T., Hansford, J. P., Hoyal Cuthill, J. F., Mannion, P. D., Martins, I. S., Payne, A. R. D., Shipley, A., Thomas, C. D., Thompson, J. B., Woods, L., & Davis, K. E. (2025). The Greatest Extinction Event in 66 Million Years? Contextualising Anthropogenic Extinctions. Global Change Biology, 31(9). https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.70476
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